LGBT faith community voices disappointment over 'Joy of Love'

Some in the LGBT faith community say Pope Francis' "Joy of Love" guidelines on family and marriage are moving in the right direction but still show the LGBT community in a negative context.

Some in the LGBT faith community say Pope Francis' "Joy of Love" guidelines on family and marriage are moving in the right direction but still show the LGBT community in a negative context. (Andreas Solaro / AFP/Getty Images)

Pope Francis' document on marriage and family was described as a "game changer" by Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich, but some prominent in LGBT faith circles say they are disappointed though not surprised by the Catholic Church's stance.

"We've given this a good go for a long time, and it doesn't seem to have penetrated into the mind of the Vatican on how sexuality and sexual ethics have changed,'' said Mary E. Hunt, co-founder and co-director of the Women's Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual (WATER).

The issue isn't just about same-sex marriage, she said, but understanding "the range in how people love, including marriage."

The 264-page apostolic exhortation, issued Friday, "reaffirms that every person, regardless of sexual orientation, ought to be respected in his or her dignity and treated with consideration, while 'every sign of unjust discrimination' is to be carefully avoided, particularly any form of aggression and violence." But the document rejects same-sex marriage: "as for proposals to place unions between homosexual persons on the same level as marriage, there are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family."

Hunt said people are working to transform the church at a community level and are no longer willing to wait for the pope to say "everything's fine now."

Francis DeBernardo, executive director of New Ways Ministry, which describes itself as a "gay-positive ministry of advocacy and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Catholics," said the document's general guidelines for pastoral care are in the right direction. But he was "very disappointed" there were "no affirmative statements" about LGBT people. He said any mentions were made in a "negative context."

"A lot of what is said has been said before,'' DeBernardo said of the document's disavowal of aggression and violence against LGBT people. Catholic bishops in many countries have ignored this in the past, he said, adding that while the document may be seen as a challenge to some of the bishops, these bishops have been challenged before.

DeBernardo said change in the Roman Catholic Church takes a long time. The first step is discussion, he said, and the second step is change in pastoral care, followed by theological reflection and doctrinal changes.

"We've made it to the second step," he said.

Given that most bishops in the United States were appointed by the more conservative Popes John Paul II or Benedict XVI, he speculated that American bishops may be slower in accepting changes. What's next is hard to predict, he added.

"We need to see how this step gets put into action, and we need to see how long Francis is in the papacy. Things can change," he said.

Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, which advocates for LGBT Catholics, said the document represents more of a sideways step than a step forward.

"This says not a whole lot has changed, folks," Duddy-Burke said, noting that while many front-line pastors may see the document as an opportunity to be more permissive with individual parishioners, LGBT people will continue "to be fired from church jobs, be denied communion at their parents' funerals, continue to see our bishops try to roll back same-sex marriage and will not hear their leaders speak out against criminalization and violence in other places."

While Duddy-Burke said no one expected the pope to endorse same-sex marriage, and that there were clear signals the document would be "middle of the road," she voiced surprise at what she saw as a "lack of respect" for LGBT people and their ability to form their own consciences and language that evoked "the burden" of having an LGBT family member.

"LGBT people are not going to find a lot of hope in institutional church," she said. "Every disappointment is, I think, the last link for some people with the church. … People have different tolerance levels."

Yet, Melinda Selmys, a Tweed, Ontario, author and Catholic Authenticity blogger, who describes herself as "a queer convert to Catholicism, writer, and mother of six kids and counting," sees positive movement in the pope's document with its more pastoral approach.

Conservatives, she said, are disappointed that the document isn't a "crackdown" on people's behavior and situations, while the liberal wing of the church was hoping for "more recognition" of the validity of same-sex marriage or partnerships, something more welcoming and more positive in terms of pastoral care for LGBT people. Selmys said "the change of tone" embodied in the document in terms of beginning to grapple with how the church can interact with LGBT people is what's important.

"The thing we have to understand is the way the church operates. It's an institution that's 2,000 years old, and the pace of movement within the Vatican is always slower,'' Selmys said. She hopes the document will have some impact on the way the church in North America handles issues relating to the sexual revolution and will soften some of the stridency.

"You can't behave in the homophobic way you've acted in past decades,'' she said.